Long jumper M Sreeshankar broke the national record at the 58th National Open athletics championships in Bhubaneshwar on Thursday with a jump of 8.20m.

The 19-year-old representing Kerala broke the record of 8.19m held by Ankit Sharma, which was set in July 2016.

Sreeshankar begun the competition strongly, clearing a distance of 7.95m in his very first jump. After fouling his second jump, he set a new personal best jumping 8.11m in his third attempt. Sreeshankar’s previous best was a jump of 7.99m set at the Federation Cup in March this year. After another foul attempt in his fourth attempt, he set the new national record in his penultimate attempt.

His 8.20m jump is the world leading jump of the season among Under-20 athletes, bettering Cuban Maikel Yorges Vidal’s 8.12m effort in June.

“I will do even better I promise. I came to Bhubaneswar to cross this 8m barrier, it was in mind. Olympics 2020 final is my target,” Sreeshankar was quoted as saying by the Athletics Federation of India.

You can watch his record-breaking jump here:

Here’s a brief background about the youngster:

Sreeshankar M

Date of Birth: March 27, 1999

Best performance so far: Gold at the Federation Cup in Patiala (2018), Gold at the National Inter-State Athletics Championships in Guwahati (2018)

Brief Description: Sreeshankar Murali’s first appearance at the Asian Games recently was the highest level at which he had competed after his sixth-place at the junior World Athletics Championships in July. All eyes were on the 19-year-old jumper from Coimbatore to see if he could live up to the hype and earn a place in India’s next big athletics hopefuls club, joining Neeraj Chopra, Hima Das and Tejaswin Shankar. After being in bronze medal contention for the initial rounds, Sreeshankar eventually finished sixth with a best attempt of 7.95m. “I’ll be back!” he said looking into the camera after his final attempt was declared a foul. And a few weeks later, he has broken the national record with a 8-plus jump.

After comprehensively winning the Federation Cup with a personal best of 7.99 metres, Sreeshankar should have made his bow at Gold Coast. However, an error by the federation in registration and a bout of appendicitis later put paid to his hopes of participating at Gold Coast. Trained by Bobby George, Sreeshankar was born to former triple jumper and runner S Murali and former 800 metre runner K Bijimol, both national-level athletes.